Stephen Colbert mocks Ben Carson’s fabulist tales about violent youth to set up his ‘conservative redemption’

Stephen Colbert took aim at some of Ben Carson’s bizarre and unsubstantiated claims about his personal history.

The “Late Show” host said the media have been “dredging up all kinds of ancient history” about Carson — including his theory about the biblical origins of the pyramids as grain silos — since he laid claim to frontrunner status ahead of Donald Trump in some key states.

“I was skeptical until I saw this ancient Egyptian diagram,” Colbert said, showing an on-screen illustration of the Food and Drug Administration’s food pyramid. “See down here? Right down there — the grain goes on the bottom. Then you get your fruits and vegetables, and up here the Egyptians kept a giant turkey.”

Colbert said the retired neurosurgeon’s beliefs about the pyramids were probably less important than his oft-repeated claim that “he tried to stab a dude when he was 14.”

“Throughout his campaign, Carson has presented his life as a conservative redemption story,” Colbert said.

Carson has claimed in his memoirs and interviews that he was a violent youth who attacked people with rocks, baseball bats and hammers, and he has said he tried to stab a friend during an argument — although reporters have been unable to verify any of those claims.

“This is a story he’s told many times, and so far, the man he tried to stab is ‘unidentified,'” Colbert said. “So we can safely assume — it’s Martin O’Malley.”

Reporters have spoken to Carson’s childhood friends and neighbors, and they have all said his claims about a violent past were inconsistent with their recollections of him as a calm and studious boy they had known.

“Wow, some childhood friends,” Colbert marveled. “I can’t believe they would stab him in the back about whether he stabbed them in the front.”